


I'll See You In My Dreams

by Cyder



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, M/M, Sherlock and John meet in dreams
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-09-29
Updated: 2016-09-29
Packaged: 2018-01-18 21:41:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 1,940
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1443898
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cyder/pseuds/Cyder
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sherlock is five and John is seven when they first meet in their dreams.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. First Encounters

**Author's Note:**

> So I know I said I wouldn't be posting anything until finals, but this lovely idea popped into my head and I just had to write it.....

Sherlock is five and John is seven when they first meet in their dreams.

Captain Holmes is steering his ship towards the nearby island for provisions when the lookout shouts for his attention. “Capt’n, a navy vessel at ten o’clock coming towards us mighty fast!” Sherlock looks up from his charts and sure enough, an English marine ship is speeding towards his own pirate ship, her British flag flying proudly against the wind. Sherlock puts on his hat and coat, and for good measure grabs his cutlass as well. He’s never before been faced with a navy ship before while on his adventures, but he couldn’t ask for a better turn of events now; charting out the different routes to Antarctica had started to bore him.

He calls the men to their positions, the tense atmosphere causing his heart to race faster by the second. He then steps onto the platform to confront the Captain of the other ship.

When he spies a seven-year-old in a navy uniform on the other side, Sherlock is quite surprised.

As a rule there are no children in Sherlock’s dreams, because he never gets along with other children; they’re all just so _stupid_ , it’s hideous. Even if it worries Mummy that Sherlock refuses to make friends with the other kids, he will never get along with them because he finds it insulting to be put on the same intellectual level as them. He’d rather not have to go through the torture of having to deal with the incompetency of children in his own dream, for god's sake. 

The boy on the naval ship seems to be just as surprised to see a five-year-old on an enemy pirate ship, but promptly dismisses his initial surprise and shouts at him across the sea.

“This is Captain John Watson of the Royal Navy, and I demand to see the captain of your pirate ship!” He barks at Sherlock, seeming to think that he’s just a messenger or servant boy of the ship. This annoys Sherlock; he hates being dismissed because of his age. Adults always assume that Sherlock won't understand a single word they say, and they always insist on talking to him as they would to a baby. Then Sherlock will be rude to them in pointing out that he wasn't any ordinary child, and Father would get mad at him, again, at his behavior and send him to his room. It was unthinkable that he should have to face the same monstrosity in his own mind; besides, shouldn't the other kid know better? He was only a kid himself! Angrily Sherlock shouts right back.

“This is Captain Sherlock Holmes of the pirate ship _Lady Evangeline_. If you do not clear a path for my ship within fifteen minutes, then prepare yourself for battle.”

Captain Watson blinks twice as if that isn’t what he’d expected to hear. Then he grins, and Sherlock has never seen anyone so grin so happily in his life; even Grand-mère doesn’t smile like that, and she’s always smiling in the presence of her beloved grandson. Seeing the other boy smile so effortlessly, so joyously, Sherlock can’t help but put on a lopsided smile himself.

“Men, prepare for battle!” He hears Captain Watson shout on the other deck.

Happily, Sherlock does the same.


	2. Proper Introductions

Sherlock forgets about the strange encounter with the stranger child in his dream until three weeks later when he meets John Watson again.

This time Sherlock is sitting in a park counting the dragons that are flying above him in the sky, when he hears a small cough beside him, and he whips his head towards the sound.

Standing to the right of the bench is that same kid he met a while ago, the one who battled with him on sea and Sherlock had deemed it enjoyable enough to make into his top ten best dreams. 

“Captain John Watson,” Sherlock says to the other boy.

Sherlock sees the relief in Captain Watson’s eyes, probably from the worry that Sherlock might not recognize him, and his thin lips curl up into an all-consuming smile that creates all kinds of wrinkles in the young boy’s face. Sherlock would have found it funny, if the wrinkles hadn’t suited the boy so well. 

“I’m not a captain now, because Harry’s taken my ship.” He wrinkles his nose as if smelling something repulsive. “It wasn’t my fault that Mum found out about the fight she had with Daniel. But she always blames everything on me.”

Sherlock takes in the other boy’s words seriously, and corrects his earlier remark. “John, then.”

John smiles. “Yep, I’m John. And you’re Sherlock.”

Sherlock nods. “I’m Sherlock.”

“Nice to meet you, Sherlock.”

Sherlock pauses a bit, because this being chummy with another kid is a new sensation for him. He settles on simply repeating John’s words back to him. “Nice to meet you too, John.” 

John, who seems satisfied that the introductions are over, climbs up to the bench that Sherlock’s occupying and lifts his head up to stare at the sky. “Are those dragons?”

Sherlock doesn’t bother looking up at the sky; instead he stares at the boy next to him, feeling like if he takes his eyes off John for even one moment, John will disappear. “Yes they are. They’re sisters and cousins, all under the rule of one matriarch. She’s off hunting right now with the warriors, and so Lucy – that’s the one with the slightly bent wings – is in charge of the little ones.” 

John nods as if he understands perfectly what Sherlock has just said. “Lucy’s a beauty. What’s a matriarch?”

“Yes, but Georgia, one of the warriors, is the prettiest. A matriarch is the female head of the family.” 

John nods again. “I see. Can you introduce them all to me?” He points up at the sky, and he flashes that smile that he showed Sherlock in their last dream, the one that got Sherlock smiling too. Sherlock wonders if he could look like that too when he smiles, and turns his head towards the blue expanding above them to explain the dragon family to John.


	3. Tree of Knowledge

Today Harry and Mum got into a fight again, which naturally meant that they both yelled at John for being so useless in anything that he did. He knows they both didn’t mean it, that he was just the most convenient thing close to them to take out their frustrations on. It doesn’t stop him from being hurt by their words.

 

The fight won’t last long; they never do, with Mum usually caving in and apologizing first and Harry breaking down and also apologizing. Then it’s all smiles and wonders until Harry gets in trouble again or Mum goes on another date, and John will once more become their verbal punching bag for them.

 

He’s only thirteen, John thinks. He shouldn’t have to deal with all this shit in his life.

 

But he knows he’s being much too selfish in thinking that, because he knows plenty of other thirteen-year-olds whose lives are thousand times worse than John’s, and besides, John’s life isn’t that bad. He’s got his friends at school who make him laugh, and he does really well in school too. And he’s got Sherlock.

 

John smiles at the thought of Sherlock, his - his best friend. Well, his secret best friend. Because normally people don’t have imaginary best friends when they’re already thirteen. They have best friends in real life, who they meet up and hang out and talk to and laugh with and be regular teenagers.

 

John and Sherlock meet up and hang out and talk to and laugh with and are generally like regular teenagers, except that they only meet in their dreams.

 

John has long gotten used to the fact that his best friend may very likely be a figment of his imagination. He tries very hard not to think about it, most times.

 

But then again, most times he doesn’t believe that, can’t really, because there’s no way his ordinary brain could have thought up of someone so extraordinary like Sherlock Holmes.

 

Because Sherlock Holmes is as extraordinary as a person can get, John is sure of it.

 

Today, they will meet at the park, just like they promised last time. And knowing that he will see Sherlock today again never fails to put John in a happy mood.

 

Once, when he was still little and didn’t fully understand how things work, John tried explaining who Sherlock was to Harry. He must have been around seven at the time, and Harry eleven. He told his sister of the boy he met in his dreams, the little boy with the wild dark hair and incredibly piercing blue eyes, about Sherlock who could play the violin better than his orchestra teacher and know what big words like matriarchy meant even though he was only five. Sherlock, who was amazing. Sherlock, who was his friend. Sherlock, and how much fun John had when he was spending time with him.

 

It physically hurt John when Harry laughed at him.

 

“An imaginary friend, really, John? Aren’t you a bit too old for all that now? For goddness' sakes, you’re seven already now, almost eight.” Harry clicked his tongue and gave him a look that dismissed her younger brother so casually. “He isn’t real, and you can’t have a not real person for your best friend.”

 

John had never been so shocked in his life.

 

John had never been so angry at his sister in his life.

 

Until then, John had never even once doubted that Sherlock was real. Because Sherlock was so different from John, and so he could never have imagined him up. But the seed of doubt had been planted, and once done, it kept on growing and growing until it has now become the forbidden tree of knowledge in the middle of his heart’s garden that John now avoids like the plague. He avoids it and avoids it, but its shadows are far too long and always reach him, and John hates Harry for planting that tree there. That is one thing he will not forgive Harry of.

 

Sherlock, if he knew what Harry had said about him, would probably scoff and dislike Harry even more. He’s never taken a liking to Harry, because he said she reminds him of his own older brother, Mycroft. And he _really_ doesn’t like Mycroft, as John has learned. All older siblings must be the same for anyone, he guesses.

 

Tonight he'll tell Sherlock about how he's decided to become a doctor when he grows up. Well, he really wanted to be a navy captain, but doctor is even better. It's something he's been thinking about for a while now, becoming a doctor. He won't ever tell Sherlock it's because it frightened John to death when Sherlock fell off a tree the other night and broke his leg and John had no idea what to do. He wonders what Sherlock's reaction will be to his declaration. He would probably just nod and tell him all the random facts he knows about different kinds of doctors. Which is good for John, because frankly he doesn't know a lick about doctors and what it takes to become on. (Yet another evidence that Sherlock is not John's imagination.) 

 

John smiles and turns the lamp on his night table off. In the darkness, he can just make out the silhouette of a tree outside his window, and the leaves that are gently blowing in the wind. He lets his mind wander, until he finally dozes off.

 

Time to go meet Sherlock. 


End file.
